


no one can censor tiger or a quick claw

by siojo



Category: One Piece
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Cats, M/M, Teasing, Welder Marco, Zoo, Zoo Keeper - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-03
Updated: 2019-06-03
Packaged: 2020-04-06 23:52:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,511
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19073224
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/siojo/pseuds/siojo
Summary: Maintenance at the zoo is always overwhelming, Marco knows, he's been working it for years now. Now if he could get his husband to stop cheating his way to the front of that queue and insisting on getting another cat.





	no one can censor tiger or a quick claw

**Author's Note:**

> There's a couple words/phrases in here that aren't common, they're explained below!
> 
> Nelsons or Nelson Waterers: water bowls that fill automatically when empty because of a weight system
> 
> Shift Doors: doors between different rooms in the night house or between the night house and the exhibit
> 
> Night House: The houses that zoos keep the animals in at night or bad weather.
> 
> Eleven-in-one: Screw driver with eleven different tops so that you can flip between flat, cross, or others.
> 
>  
> 
> (the title is taken from Fickle as Tiger by Henry Treece, at least partly)

Marco sighs as his phone rings, flexing his fingers as he sets down the piece of metal that he had been cutting down for the last hour, shaping it into what he needed for the shift door that had broken in Great Apes.

“This is Marco Newgate.”

“That shift door giving you issues?” Ace asks. “Because if so, I have an intern that is sitting around doing nothing for the next three hours.”

Marco laughs, tugging off his gloves as he leans back against his work table, balancing his phone between his shoulder and his ear, “You and I both know that I’m not allowed to use your interns for physical labor. But, we both know you aren’t calling to ask what i’m up to.”

“I could be. You never tell me what you’re working on unless I ask you at work and you know everything about my cats.”

“That’s because you’ve been trying to convince me to let you get another cat.”

“We could have two whole cats and you have been denying me, Marco. The house is empty and that’s why Kotatsu keeps getting himself into trouble, there’s nothing for him to do.”

Marco snorts, rolling his eyes as he crosses his arms over his chest, “Ace, between the two of us, we built and installed the most elaborate system of shelves and tunnels inside the walls for him. He is not bored, he’s just a trouble maker. Now, why are you stalling?”

“Two of our Nelsons went down. It wouldn’t be such a big deal if they were in the night house, but they’re the only two on exhibit and you know that Nicki and Monroe won’t stay on exhibit when it’s hot out.”

“It’s always Nicki and Monroe,” Marco sighs as he pushing himself upright. “Alright, are they off exhibit currently?”

Ace laughs, “You know that they are. I’ll get the shift doors in place and locked.”

“You owe me dinner for this.”

“I owe you dinner every night, we’re married.”

“Which is why, you should know better than to call me for things like this on my cell. Give me twenty minutes and I’ll be there to fix up the Nelsons. Don’t do something foolish like try to fix it yourself again.”

“I didn’t break the weight on purpose, Marco,” Ace whines and Marco can barely bite back a grin. “Thanks, you know the Nelsons always have issues as soon as summer hits.”

“Hm, see you in a few,” Marco doesn’t wait for an answer, ending the call and setting his phone on the table before undoing the apron that he had been wearing and throwing it on top of his gloves as Bonney peered into his workshop.

“You’re looking tired, need some help?”

“Not unless you want to spend the rest of your day in the tiger exhibit fixing Nelsons,” Marco answers, stretching tiredly. “I know how much you love them.”

Bonney laughs, sharp and sarcastic, “Miss me with that. I think Enel might want to go play with some water. Huh, Zappy?”

“Not unless I can leave you to rewire the electrical panel at the gift shop,” Enel shouts back, balancing two bundles of electrical wire on one arm as he locked the supply room behind him. “They need another breaker.”

“I got them to sign off on never touching that shit. What about you, Makino?”

Makino hums, sliding her headphones off her head as she released the start switch for the table saw, “Did you say something?”

“Get to work, Bonney. I know you have more work to do. I’ll take care of the Nelsons. Did you need something?” Marco asks, unplugging his golf cart from the charger and making sure to shift it out of the way. “Or were you hoping for gossip?”

Bonney pouts, “I live for gossip boss, it sustains me. Please give me some, the bird keepers have so much and I can’t keep trying to seduce myself a pretty girl if I don’t have the goss.”

“Please stop talking about seducing pretty girls. This is work, not a bar.”

“That’s just because you’re married!” Bonney whines moving to drop dramatically onto her golf cart, flipping through her work orders. “You don’t need to seduce pretty girls when you’re married.”

Makino rolls her eyes, “You know, she’s going to realize that you didn’t tell her that Ace was your husband and she’ll be offended. Seriously offended, because she tells you so much about herself.”

“I didn’t even tell you that I was married,” Marco reminds her, watching Bonney prodding Enel into taking her on his work order, something about laying conduit and pulling wire. “You knew Ace before I married him.”

“Before you started dating him. Now go fix the Nelson waterers before you get Ace calling because he’s taken them apart himself.”

“Answer any calls that come through.”

“Maintenance has died, please try again in two weeks when we’ve hired new staff!” Makino shouts after him, already pulling her headphones back into place.

Marco shakes his head, making sure to turn his radio up as he heads off towards Tiger, barely avoiding Luffy as he hurries across the parking lot in his own cart responding to something on his radio. He hopes distantly that it’s not something broken, because if one more thing breaks, he’s going to break the zoo.

“That is not a happy face,” Ace states, pushing himself up off the wall outside of tiger. “Did something happen on the way over?”

“Luffy’s speeding again.”

Ace rolls his eyes, “I can’t control my brother anymore than you can control yours. I think there’s a couple of their apes that are going to give birth soon, but you know I don’t pay attention to anything but the cats.”

“We’re still not getting another one,” Marco states, digging through his tool bag for a pair of pliers and his eleven-in-one. “Alright, take me to the Nelsons.”

“Like you don’t know where they are already,” Ace states, leading the way into the night house and waving to his intern. “Coby, don’t move from there for ten minutes.”

“I haven’t moved at all?”

“There’s Nicki, as you can see, the shift door is in place and both of the locks are locked. Monroe is over here and he has the same. Follow me outside,” Ace says ignoring Coby’s response as he unlocks the door to the first exhibit. “Thank you for letting me jump the line.”

“Only because we both know that if the big cats aren’t on display people get upset,” Marco states, kneeling down as he twists the top off of the system and slides the bowl out. “Do the bird keepers have all the hot gossip?”

Ace snorts, “Who told you that?”

“Bonney.”

“Everyone has hot gossip, it just depends on what you find interesting. Now I have an intern to distract, come get me when you’re done with this one and I’ll let you into the other exhibit?”

“Only if you make that thing for dinner, the one that you made last week with the steak bits. I’m letting you be bossy and skip the queue, I think I deserve something nice.”

“You let me be bossy because you love me,” Ace shouts over his shoulder as he heads back inside.

Marco sighs, shaking his head as he gets to work, because Ace was right. He did love him, even if that wasn’t why he let Ace skip the queue, not that he needed to know that.

“If people are going to keep calling me on my phone,” Marco sighs tiredly, digging his phone out of his pocket, “Marco Newgate.”

“My radio died,” Bonney states instantly. “And Enel’s maybe in the supply room. We need help, there’s wasps here.”

“I’ll radio for the pest control to come help you. Please just text from now on, you know I hate when I have to stop doing things to answer a call,” Marco rolls his eyes as Ace glances out the door, rolling his eyes. “And I have been told that your taste in gossip is subpar.”

Ace laughs as Marco hangs up his phone, “She’s going to want answers.”

“And she can wait. It’s not my job to show her where the good gossip is, my job is to make sure that she isn’t getting herself in trouble. It’s Makino and Enel’s job to get her into the good gossip, they seem to run the gossip mill.”

“Thank you, I’m headed to Leopard, can I trust you to call me when you’re done?”

“You trust me not to kill you,” Marco says, grinning when Ace rolls his eyes.

“I’m divorcing you,” Ace states heading back inside. “Coby, come on. We have a leopard to go work with.”

Marco shakes his head, adjusting the water flow again to run a test. The last time Ace had claimed to want a divorce, he had come home with the supplies for Kotatsu’s wall climbing things. Hopefully he wouldn’t come home with a kitten this time, three would be too many.


End file.
